Movement for a People’s Party

Last week Nick Braña announced the next stage in his effort–the Draft Bernie movement has become the ‘Movement for a People’s Party’. In a recent interview on the Jimmy Dore Show, Braña explained that although progressives have the numbers, they are ‘too atomized’ to be successful at the polls. He hopes to remedy that situation by enabling collaborative efforts toward independent politics. The new movement’s priority is coalition building, or a pooling of resources rather than a merging of various groups, however the end goal remains the same–the creation of a new party.

Previously the Draft Bernie effort looked like a catch-22. How do you recruit people without a platform, and what good is a platform if you don’t have the organizational structure to implement it? Furthermore, unless the new party could really challenge the Democratic Party it would have to compete for Democratic votes–somewhat like the Green Party in the 2016 election—which is not exactly an inspiring prospect for people who hoped to blow the Democratic Party out of the water. Today all that remains is the conviction that the two-party system has to go–and a new strategy. Considering that the Draft Bernie team is not alone in their vision for a third-party, that should be enough.

Nick often cites a recent Gallop poll revealing that 61% of Americans are fed up with the existing parties. Then there’s the recent AFL-CIO conference, where a third-party was a hot topic of conversation. In other words, this is something people want. The Draft Bernie movement started out as a daring wager that Bernie would leave the Democratic Party. Little did they know, giving up would not be an option. People’s Party, it’s time to get serious.(forapeoplesparty.org)